Everybody Lies
by Amber Kane
Summary: Character History from Unseen Heroes, another FanFic In-Progress Book I'm making. Andra has two lives-one in the mortal world and the one at Camp Silviens-but sometimes she doesn't know which is one is real. Or who she really is. Romance/Tragedy/Friendship/Hurt-Comfort/Fantasy/Adventure/Humor. It may be confusing at first, but it'll be good. I can feel it. ;)
1. Prologue and Beginning

The story of how Andra found the Silviens, what her life is like at home, and her life with the Silviens before Alex joins is all going to be in here, but this is not really an official story, just collections of her memories and past. Don't worry, I'll still be working on the Unseen Heroes, but I just had to have a background story for Andra, she is just a fascinating character with a lot to tell and also a lot to hide. If you have not read the Unseen Heroes(my other in-progress book) thats alright, it might help a little, but everything will be explained more as the story goes on. She's 13, almost 14, for the part after the PROLOGUE, but I'll make sure you'll know if I jump to a different time with she's a different age. She is so much deeper than her age, like a few of us, in fact. If you have any questions just comment or review, or you can email me at atragedyofateenager at gmail dot com Thanx

**PROLOGUE**

_And it thought I was done with reliving my past for the day._  
Disjointed memories, some of them the worst times of my life, fly through my mind: A dark haired man pulls out a gun from a locker and whips the boy in the face with it, he crumples to the ground, and I see myself cry out a split second earlier, a look of horror on my face and then dive behind a plastic table as the man turns, pointing his gun around at running, screaming people, firing shots…  
I am standing in a dark alleyway and swallowing hard, white pills from a small orange canister…  
A previous version of myself with no scar hidden by my hair runs as if in slow motion towards a room where a boy lays on the ground under a much bigger one with a gun, who points it down and pulls the trigger, and my younger self screams, more out of fury than fright, as blood splatters the glass windows…  
I am kissing a boy with short-cropped brown hair in the middle of a dark forest, as if this is the last time I will ever see him…  
I am sitting alone at a middle school lunch table, when something large hurtles through the brick walls…  
A starving girl grips my fingers and I can say nothing, because I know it will not be alright…  
She lifts her finger from my forehead and smiles as I resist falling to the ground. "You _are _strong."  
Yes, I am a Silvien now.

**(ALMOST) 1 YEAR LATER  
ABANDONED WAREHOUSE, 409 TORKUO STREET, ILLINOIS  
BASEMENT, 4:26 PM**

"I don't trust you anymore." It is the truth.  
Nick gives one short, humorless laugh. "No-one does. Anymore."  
I blink slowly. When I opened my eyes, they are turned to the bloody man on the floor, a surprised look coming through on his angry expression. I kick him hard, and his head rolls over on its neck to face the wall.  
"He's dead." My tone is emotionless.  
"Yes." So is his.  
"There was no need to kill him." The conversation was getting dangerous now, but I knew how to play this game.  
"Soldier's reflex." He dodges the bullet simply.  
"Training doesn't teach you to go for the kill."  
"Training doesn't, but the battlefield does. I can't trust anyone." He parries.  
The dominant half of me right now, the part that acts on what my brain doesn't know but the rest of me does, settles on a decision. My brain tries to counter, but I shut it down. This Nick, this is not the boy I once knew, he has been changed beyond repair over the last years. I still know how to manipulate him, but I know I shouldn't feel bad about it. Should I?  
"No-one?" I say quietly. "Not even me?"  
He notices my tone, and the faintest flicker of something draws across his features and darts away, like a shadow. "You just said you don't trust me."  
"I don't." I say, talking miniscule steps towards him.  
"And you trust me now? You can't be that stupid." He grins nastily. I'm a few inches in front of him, and my seeing side grabs information and throws it together, then moves my body and makes me say the words that are taking me where I want to go. The gun's metal is cold and hard, pressed against my back, and I know I am acting on mere suspicions, that in a few seconds, I could be dead…  
"We all do stupid things." I say.  
"True." His breath is on my cheek, and it smells like smoke.  
I lean in, kiss him on the mouth, and stifle any feelings that attempt to make their way from my conscience to my dormant brain, whether good or bad, but kissing Nick isn't unpleasant. He has soft lips and closes his pale green eyes when he does it, never suspecting. I lean into him, twist my arm around him and reach. My fingers contact cold, corrugated metal, and I shift my weight back. The bullet pierces through his spine with a brittle crack, and into his heart, and Nick dies with his eyes still closed, crumpling to his knees and falling forwards as I back away. I tuck the extra gun into my bag, pull out the one concealed in the back of my jacket, and turn out the lights, leaving a faint glow coming from the doorway. After a few more shots in his general direction to ensure he is not in silent, drawn out pain, although I tell mysef it's to make sure he's dead, I walk briskly away, closing the door behind me, and plunging the two dead bodies in darkness.

A black cat with dark brown stripes and white fur on the tip of his tail joins me on my return trip, but I'm glad he can't speak. No words can help, but I don't need them anyway. I'll survive. The hallways still seem as cold as they first were, grey and duplex white tiles, simple. When I reach the main storage room, Naomi's face is its dependable self, pale and worried. Pal_er_, I should say; her average skin color is white as marble. The cat darts off into the gloom as Naomi breathes a quiet sigh of relief-even after knowing me for this long, she still wasn't sure if I would make it out alive- looks at my blank expression, and shivers. She has never had the bad side of me inflicted on her. No doubt she heard the gunshots from below, though, and hated being stuck up here, unable, but also unwilling to get into a fight. She is a healer, after all, not a warrior. She matches my brisk pace, and I think I hear "sorry" in a whisper as quiet as the wind, but I don't know if she has said this or if I am imagining things, but it doesn't matter, beacuse soon we are walking out into the tiny courtyard surrounded by trees, away, and into the forest beyond, to the place where I cannot be myself anymore.


	2. Chapter 2

I am not sure what I am feeling, but I know there are some feelings I cannot let myself register, and consequently any feelings that would help are trapped inside as well, but the concerns outweigh the advantages. I keep everything bottled up.

It feels like my subconscious is still moving me through the patterns, unfeeling, and knowing what to do. I've never had it on for this long before, but the effect of knowing what is going to happen before it does, and everything else, is starting to die away, leaving only numbness behind, like when your leg falls asleep. But it's okay, better than having an emotional breakdown, or worse, letting others see your emotional breakdown. What they expect of me is strength, not weakness. Or is that just what I expect of myself?

The trip through the Labyrinth is quick and easy, nothing confronts us, and I don't stop moving my legs, even when we are faced by a blank slab of dead end wall, which I recklessly walk through. When we reach the hill Naomi glances at me and then leaves at the bottom of the hill, towards the plaza, while I turn to the forest. I'm not much fun to be around when I've just killed someone, am I now? I would be glad that the streets are empty of both campers and salesmen, but I keep even that tidbit of relief in; right now all of my emotions are trapped in a tiny crevice deep in my body, I am not ready for them to come out yet, although I am sure they will…

I reach a dirt pathway leading to the forest, and I stop moving at last. There is a long, worn wooden house painted a dark gray color with a wooden door which swings open at the lightest touch of my finger.  
I have been here two times before, to make bracelets for the three people I have already taken lives from, although I never knew them, only their pasts. Inside it is blank except for carvings on the ceiling. There are long tables that resemble picnic benches, except that they are free of any writing or graffiti, built out of stone, and have spools of every color of string imaginable built into the middle of them.  
The place is mostly empty- in the left corner there is a girl with unkempt blonde hair that clearly used to be beautiful, hanging around her face, hiding it from view. She has the appearance of someone who has gained a lot of weight in a short amount of time, and I can see her colors of soft gold and light grey intertwining, out of many others, into a graceful bracelet.  
At a table behind her is someone I would not expect – Irene, I am almost sure, with her light white-blonde hair in a perfect ringlet ponytail and her rimless glasses, her weaving hidden by her arm. She does not turn to look at me, and I do not call out to her or the blonde girl. I do not know what will come out when I speak.  
I sit down at a bench and grab colors – an ugly 'spring green' color, a rich purple, and a commercial blue. These colors look so fake, compared to a watery navy the exact color of shadowy ocean depths right next to it, or a pallid green of frost-covered grass, but I keep the colors I have. The first part of the bracelet is intricate, and as I work everything around me is irrelevant – this room is simple, and silent.

I tie knots and layer them in a twisting, complicated, beautiful-once-you-look-past-the-mistakes spiral. That's how Nick was, before, before he went off to fight in a war no-one wanted him to fight, before he joined the wrong side, before he escaped the wrath of the Olympians by fleeing. Once upon a time, he could have been one himself, he had it in himself to become a hero. One simple knot comes next - change. After that he strings are just loosely twisted together, as if unwinding, his character starting to seep out and into the Titan's task force, although he was just another demigod to them, until they hit the next knot. After that one, they are straight and unconnected and stretch on for a while-I'm not sure what he was like then, but I'm sure by the time Kronos was defeated, he was not himself anymore. At the very end, the strands are braided together loosely, and the bracelet ends abruptly with a harsh, simple knot, for a harsh, simple death. I try to convince myself his death was necessary, because if it was not, I would not be able to bear it.  
When I look up, Irene is gone, but the blonde girl had her head in her hands. I stand up quietly, put my foot on the stone bench, and bend down with both ends of the bracelet in my hands. As I tie them together around my right ankle and let them drop, connected, what had seemed like an enormous weight lifts from my heart, although it is actually quite light, like a lot of air trapped in your lungs making it feel like they are full. This is replaced by a smaller, heavier, hardened weight. I put my foot on the ground and walked out through the door.  
The streets are full now, and I know I will be recognized. Without thinking, mind still blank, although in a different way, I reach my hands up and untie my dirty ponytail. Hair falls in around my face, lank and dirty, and smelling ever so faintly of smoke. A tear traces its way uninvited down my face, and I brush it away, shove my glasses deeper into my pocket, and shoulder my bag more tightly to my side, feeling the hard, cold gun press into my abdomen through the flimsy cloth. Keeping the painful, jabbing metal firmly in place, I walk towards the streets and join the throng of moving, rushing people, feeling older and more alone than I ever have before.

Dinner is a drag, and I sit in a corner booth next to the wall that seats two instead of the enormous buffet-seater I usually sit at with everyone else. My stomach is hungry, even if I do not want to eat, but my mashed potatoes taste bland, and I don't know why I got them, either, because I don't like mashed potatoes.  
A few minutes after I sit down, Anders comes over and sits into the seat across from me and my unfinished food, and looks at me. I am slightly annoyed by his company until I remember that he has killed someone, too, someone he cared about. He has killed at least twice as many people than me, judging by the number of bracelets, but there is one bracelet that seems to want to come off, and has many knots holding it around his ankle. I have never payed a lot of attention to it, but that bracelet is the most beautiful by far, with fiery reds and oranges, and a calm white intertwining between a deep black on which the entire bracelet is wrapped around. He does not say anything, but just into my eyes with his own, so dark brown they are almost black, so old beyond his years, and I almost willingly let my blank emotional shield dissipate, revealing whatever I have bottled up inside me for a moment. After a minute, he stretches out a hand with fingers even longer than my own and places it on top of mine, resting on the tabletop. His hands are tanned and callused from years of sword fighting, and mine look as pale as Naomi's in comparison. I don't think it is comforting, but it is something – I don't feel as alone anymore.


	3. Chapter 3

After dinner, I'm not sure where to go. I'm surprised I haven't been called anywhere, to discuss. Most people throw a party after their first mission, but I think throwing up would be more apropriate right now. I walk towards the lake with my hair still down, and the amount of chatting, wlaking people slowly wanes as I somehow naviagte my way to the lake, although I have gotten lost many, many times in all these streets. The lake is clear, calm, and reflects the stars from above, along with the night sky. There are cliffs up by one end of the lake, that slope down on boths sides to rocky areas, which then eventually recede to sand. I take off my black boots and leave them alone on the sand; I am not worried that anyone will steal them, and then find a place right next to the water on top of a large rock where I hug my knees and stare at the water. I like being by the rocks, they make me feel small, something I rarely experience with my 5 foot 8 height. My hair drifts a bit in the breeze, and it feels like before there were clouds and mists inside my body, but now everything has cleared. Maybe now it won't hurt to think about what I have just done. Or maybe it will.  
I almost fall off the rock when I hear my name. "Andra?" I look over and Anders is clambering over the rocks, finally climbing up next to me on mine and sighing. "How are you? No, don't answer that. I understand if you don't want to talk, but it might help..." he looks over at me. I don't see how it will help, but Anders is one of the best, smartest, frindliest, most trustworhty, understanding people I know. I open my mouth and what comes out is a half-strangled, choking sound, intermixed with a kind of sob and scream. Anders shakes his head. "You can't keep it in like that. It doesn't work, it drives you insane. I know." I take a breath, hating myself for appearing so weak, and begin.  
"Nick was a childhood friend, before I had ever joined the Silviens, I was his best friend and he was mine. Back then he was strong, and friendly, and fun to be around, and whenever I was with him, I would feel safe, and powerful...I could tell him all my secrets, even how I could do strange things with water and..and never felt safe by the ocean, right? And he would take it in, and tell me secrets of his own - he liked purple, and he could run faster than a car. When we were teens.."  
I stop, my voice scratchy and hoarse, and breathe again.  
"Our friendship was... battered. We went to rival schools, and our friends teased us, calling me his girlfriend, whispering about us behind my back. I discovered Camp Silviens a few months after he found Camp...Camp Half-Blood, found out he was a son of Hermes, and I obviously couldn't tell him why I was always so busy, but during those months while he was visiting his 'Uncle'"- I say the word nastily-" over the weekends, and when he was never home, I was mad at him, and I-I ended up screaming at him in one of my..tempers...to leave forever or explain himself, and he told me he-" I stumble, trying to remember the most painful detail, what has made this so much worse-"-he said, he said he loved me." My words are coming out faster now, as if Anders won't stay to hear the whole thing. "I didn't love him, though, but I hated that he had made our friendship unbearable. So I left, I met people, I explored, and I discovered Camp Silviens. Now I feel like...like it was my fault he joined them. It probably is." I am eternally grateful to Anders for not saying it is not my fault, because I know it is, now that I have said it out loud.  
"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." he says quietly "but you are strong enough. I don't know if this will make you stronger, Andra, but it will not weaken you unless you let it. You will make it through. It will just take time." I laugh derisevely, unhumorously- I sound like a mad person. Probably look like it too.  
"So, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger-unless you're me." I conclude. He half-smiles.  
"My story is remarkably like yours... I have someone too, a girl who I did not love, but who loved me, and we were also best friends...she was too brave, too reckless, and she got herself killed...after we fought. I will blame myself forever."  
I want to tell him its not his fault too, but I don't know, and I won't lie. I stretch down a long leg and dip my toe into the cool water. Yes, it will take time. I will not heal right away. But when I do, I will be stronger than before.  
Anders slips off of the rock, and I follow him, and we stand, facing each other in the darkness, everything illuminated by the moon and a faint yellow glow from the building on the other side of the lake, andbehind us. All at once, I come towards him, and he comes towards me, and we meet eachother in a hug, so tight that I know for sure we are bonding our friendship just as strongly, where it will never break apart. I am scared for a moment that Anders is going to kiss me or something, but then I laugh mentally-who would want to kiss me? I'm glad he doesn't, it would just make me more mixed up. But when we pull away, I smile at him, the first smile of the day, and we walk up to our rooms together, leaping over rocks and racing up the steep slope heading up from the lake, at the top of which I stand, hands on my knees, panting, and although some fo the clouds come back, and my smile fades, I know I will be alright.


	4. Chapter 4

After dinner, I'm not sure where to go. I'm surprised I haven't been called anywhere, to discuss. Most people throw a party after their first mission, but I think throwing up would be more appropriate right now. I walk towards the lake with my hair still down, and the amount of chatting, walking people slowly wanes as I somehow navigate my way to the lake, although I have gotten lost many, many times in all these streets. The lake is clear, calm, and reflects the stars from above, along with the night sky. There are cliffs up by one end of the lake, that slope down on both sides to rocky areas, which then eventually recede to sand.  
I take off my black boots and leave them alone on the sand, and then find a place right next to the water on top of a large rock where I hug my knees and stare at the water. I like being by the rocks, they make me feel small, something I rarely experience with my 5 foot 8 height. My hair drifts a bit in the breeze, and it feels like before there were clouds and mists inside my body, but now everything has cleared. Maybe now it won't hurt to think about what I have just done. Or maybe it will.  
I almost fall off the rock when I hear my name.  
"Andra?"  
I look over and Anders is clambering over the rocks, finally climbing up next to me on mine and sighing.  
"How are you?" He crosses himself silently. "No, don't answer that."  
I sit in silence - or maybe now _we_ sit in silence. It isn't awkward, it's nothing, nothing at all. It's broken quickly, though.  
"I understand if you don't want to talk, but it helps." He looks over at me. I don't see how it will help, but Anders is one of the best, smartest, friendliest, most trustworthy, understanding people I know.

I open my mouth and what comes out is a half-strangled, choking sound, intermixed with a kind of sob and scream. Anders shakes his head. "You can't keep it in like that. It doesn't work, it drives you insane. I know."

I take a breath. Normally, I would hate myself for appearing so weak, but I am still numb. I hesitate.  
"Who?" Anders' voice is quiet.  
"Nicholas…Cadmus Nicholas Adair, but he hated his first name. He was a childhood friend, before I had ever joined the Silviens, and I was his best friend, and he was mine." My mind washes up a surprising amount of dregs of memories.  
"Back then he was strong, and friendly, and fun to be around, and whenever I was with him, I would feel safe, and powerful. I could tell him all my secrets, even how I could do strange things with water and..and never felt safe by the ocean, right? And he would take it in, and tell me secrets of his own - he liked purple, and he could run faster than a car. When we were teens..."  
I stop, my voice scratchy and hoarse, and breathe again. I will not, I cannot think now. I cannot hesitate.  
"Our friendship was... battered. We went to rival schools, and our friends teased us, calling me his girlfriend, whispering about us behind my back. I discovered Camp Silviens a few months after he found Camp...Camp Half-Blood, found out he was a son of Hermes, and I obviously couldn't tell him why I was always so busy, but during those months while he was visiting camp – he told me he was visiting his 'Uncle', and over the weekends, and when he was never home, I was mad at him, and I-I ended up screaming at him in rage. I told him to leave forever or explain himself, and he told me he-" I stumble, trying to remember the most painful detail, what has made this so much worse-"-he said, he said he loved me."  
My words are coming out faster now, as if Anders won't stay to hear the whole thing. "I liked him, he was like a sibling, a brother, more than a friend to me, but I didn't love him, though, and I hated that with telling me the truth he had made our friendship unbearable. So I left, I met people, I explored, and I discovered Camp Silviens. Now I feel like...like it was my fault he joined them. It probably is." I am eternally grateful to Anders for not saying it is not my fault, because I know the truth, I know that it is my fault, now that I have said it out loud. It's just as bad as when I thought it, but somehow seems simpler.  
"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Anders says quietly "but you are strong enough. You will need others, Andra. You can't deal with it all alone."  
"I'll be alone until I am no longer weak."  
"I don't know if this will make you stronger but it will not weaken you unless you let it. It'll just take time."  
I laugh derisively, unhumorously. I sound like a mad person. Probably look like it too.  
"So, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger-unless you're me." I conclude. He half-smiles for some unfathomable reason.  
He nods. "My story is remarkably like yours... I have someone too, a girl who I did not love, but who loved me, and we were also best friends...she was too brave, too reckless, and she got herself killed...after we fought. I will blame myself forever."  
I want to tell him its not his fault too, but I don't know, and I won't lie. I stretch down a long leg and dip my toe into the cool water. I see part of what he is telling me. Yes, it will take time. I will not heal right away. But when I do, I will be stronger than before.  
Anders slips off of the rock, and I follow him, and we stand, facing each other in the darkness, everything illuminated by the moon and a faint yellow glow from the building on the other side of the lake, and behind us. All at once, we meet eachother in a hug, so tight that I know for sure we are bonding our friendship just as strongly, where it will never break apart. When I pull away, a half-smile forms on my lips. It's not much, and I'm not sure why, but it's the first smile of the day. We have to leap over rocks to get to the steep slope heading up from the lake, and exhaustion rolls over me, the hill looking menacing and tiring. There is only one thing to do.

"Race you." I sprint off and up the hill, and Anders' laughing and the rustle of the grass from his footsteps follow me to the top, where I stop, hands on my knees, panting. Some of the clouds come back, and my smile fades, but I know I will be alright.


	5. Chapter 5 (ALEX)

ALEX (FPV)

The two or three uncomfortable looking slipper chairs in the corner of the small, standard Silvien healing room were all occupied, with teens everywhere from nerdy to punk sitting or standing around anxiously and actually conversing with each other hushedly.

A cheap looking love seat couch in the other corner of the room had only a single occupant - a girl - or perhaps a woman - who was bent over, texting someone, and whose face I couldn't see because of her long, pitched hair.

Through a small doorway a crowd of people stood packed tightly together all around something. As if in a dream, I walked - or floated, almost - (my mind felt like I had been given an overdose of sleeping drugs, and everything seemed blank and kind of airy) - through the doorway, and approached the crowd of teens. Two people parted, and one of them - a girl with faux maroon-red hair and dark eyeliner - gave me a sideways look and I thought I caught a flicker of sympathy in her eyes before I gazed at the scene below me.

Andra looked dead already - pallid skin, hair streaked with blood, dirt, and something wet - water? sweat? A slow roll of nausea went through my stomach as I realized she still had her hair strung up into a familiar, ever-tight ponytail. The bottom half of her tunic-like grayish black shirt was ripped away, and cold, pure ices wrapped in some kind of transparent wrapping were draped over her abdomen, her pale stomach distorted through the ice and just slightly protruding from her body under the ice packs, rising and falling as she breathed. Her right elbow was heavily bandaged with thick, plaster like bandages that had writing on them in some ancient language.

Almost in a trance, I started to put my hand on her arm, and then whipped them away and watched for a moment as angry red blisters immediately started forming on my fingertips. Her skin was almost literally burning, like a pan on the stovetop. Naomi, who I hadn't noticed before in an identical healing uniform as the others silently switched out ice on her forehead, didn't look how she normally did when she was healing people - there was no concentrated, rapturous expression. A spot of water whose source I didn't bother to locate fell and dropped onto Andra's face. It sizzled as it met her skin, and I watched as a red spot formed on Andra's pale cheek where the water had evaporated. It was gone within seconds, leaving her skin just as it had looked before. After staring at the ceiling for a second, I realized that the drop of water had not been water but a single tear - Naomi still had her face down, but there were no more tears.

Other healer-aspiring teens were bent over Andra's scarred, bruised, slightly red legs that were covered with ice packs like the ones on her abdomen, lining her strong calves and kind of thick, muscled thighs, muttering things I couldn't hear to each other. Almost all of her legs were exposed until halfway up the thigh, where ripped, dirty black leggings covered her burning skin. Those were also covered with ice.

But the worst part for me, after I had seen it all, was her face. Eyes closed, but as if someone was holding them closed, not peaceful like in sleep. Her face was strained, and sometimes it looked like she twitched, although it was hard to tell through all the people messing with her. I pushed a wisp of hair that stuck up in front of her earlobe behind her ear, ignoring the slight burn as my finger made contact with her skin, and then my feet briskly turned and walked away - quicker and quicker, until I had gotten out of the building at a full sprint. I didn't know where I was going - I just ran down the streets, winding, my feet pounding on the silent, still pavement, passing past the dark shops and booths, the moon starting to rise above me. I ran and ran and ran, my breathing started to come out in short bursts, until I finally stopped at the top of a hill overlooking a the lake. Thick clouds blocked some of the sky from view, reflecting down in the lake, but the moon shone brightly.

I sat down, my head in my hands, trying to ignore the searing pain that seemed to be coming form the center of my body every time my thoughts strayed. I sat for a half hour before exhaustion overcame me, and the grass brushed my face as I sank into a troubled, desperate sleep.


	6. Chapter 6

Slowly, barely, I became conscious. Eventually, feeling came to my limbs and rich air filtrated through me, but there was no sense of relief - I didn't need air.  
Soon, I sensed that I lay on the ground in an unknown place.  
It felt peaceful, and safe. I didn't want to get up.

After lying around for a while - it could have been a few seconds or many days - I opened my eyes. Cool, white marble stretched out all around me until it hit a curved marble wall, forming a circle. I rolled slowly, smoothly onto my back, feeling the coolness on my bare shoulders. Above me, a domed ceiling with exquisite, shadowy ridges arced up to a large, clean circle in the middle of the ceiling. Bright light shone down from it, but not too bright - casting a circle of white, pure light on the marble and making the room's carved features dimly visible. The room was empty and large.

I closed my eyes and stretched my legs. Where I was didn't trouble me in the least. I was entertained, slightly drowsy, and felt full of rich feeling and the perfect balance of cool and warm. I lay on the ground a while longer, and my mind began to awaken. As it did, the slightest wisp of a distant memory arose - it seemed from a long time ago, perhaps a past lifetime. It was a color: the precise golden color of a stalk of wheat in a field. Nothing about this lone thought seemed important except the color. I wanted to see that color.

Something soft brushed my nose. I opened my eyes once more and noticed amusedly that I lay in a long field of golden rays of wheat. I still lay on marble, however - an even shape of perfect grey and white in the vastness of still, silent gold. I smiled ever so slightly and closed my eyes again until I heard a voice, saying a name.  
"Andronike."

It was the voice of a strong spray of the ocean, a powerful and calm being that revealed nothing from its soft tones. A flicker of emotion darted through my mind. I had not invited this visitor.

When I opened my eyes again, reluctantly, the golden rays were ruffled with wind, blowing in a slight, comfortable breeze. I rose smoothly to my feet - one instant I was on the ground, the next I was standing firmly on my bed of marble. Two forms in the shapes of humans approached me, moving briskly and seamlessly through the golden stalks. When I spoke, my voice was toneless and cool as the marble my feet stood upon.  
"I do not answer to that name anymore, Hippothoe."

I knew her name, although I didn't know how, but it didn't make a difference. Her name meant nothing to me. As they came into view, I noticed the second figure was slender and skinny, with flowing, lush hair and a beautiful face that sparkled ever so slightly as she passed through the lit air.  
"We are only here to help, daughter of ember." Hippothoe told me. "May we be seated?"  
I kept my gaze on Hippothoe as I effortlessly changed the scene - after a moment, we stood on a hilltop with stone slabs nestled into the ground around a raised circular stone - a table. The sky was clouded and still. There was no wind at first, but slowly I noticed a soft, cool breeze flow around us, gradually increasing and decreasing in velocity. Hippothoe sat, but the other stared back at me, hair floating in the moving air, lips curved in a small smile. Hippothoe sighed. "Sister, please."  
She did not sit, but then another name came from my mouth:  
"Erato."  
Her smile vanished. As if my words had been a command, she slowly sat next to Hippothoe on a stone slab as I knelt and sat on the one directly behind me. Hippothoe sat straight up, legs stretched out in front of her, and watched me intently.

"If you do not answer to Andronike - the name of a warrior, the name of victory - then what are you now, strong one?" She seemed almost sad.  
What was I now? What had I ever been?  
"I have not cast away that title completely, Hippothoe - it is merely that of a former existence."  
Erato gave me a simpering smile.

Hippothoe shook her head, but Erato concentrated on me, and after a moment, I leapt to my feet, brimming with anger. "Abi ad infernum." I swore at her. I knew what she was trying to do. Erato rose to her feet as well, sneering angrily and triumphantly, and suddenly I was absent from the hilltop, now in a crowded hallway filled with rushing teenagers. I concentrated on my hilltop, but nothing came, and I became increasingly angrier. Then, a painful sensation came from the center of my body, and I whirled around, face to face with a boy with deep, conflicted eyes. He gave no sign that he saw me, but I staggered back as if I had been punched. His face brought back a violent rush of memories I couldn't suppress with all my might.  
"Come on, then." he said quietly, still staring not quite at me but through me. "What's it going to be?" He sounded uncertain, like he was reading lines off of a script for a play. "All your life you've suppressed feelings that you thought were going to make you weak. But, you could enjoy life, you know. We'll always stand with you. Even..um, even me." He looked ashamed, and then embarrassed. "Because, you know, it's not like...I mean, we could...I don't want it..." People walking by start to watch him as if they were just realizing he was there, and he ducked quickly into the throng of teenagers, leaving me standing alone.

And then, suddenly, I was on the dark banks of a river, watching a girl in a long dark cloak with a large hood converse rapidly with an excruciatingly thin child. Next to her stood a teenage boy with a sweeping, choppy hairdo and a cute face. One of his hands was clasped with the girl's. Suddenly the same boy from before appeared in the shadows of a shabby building nearby built on mud, and stared directly at me for a second until his gaze shifted to the girl on the bank. A glistening drop of something traced a path around his nose, and I felt tears collecting in my own eyes and he turned on his heel and ran.

Finally, I leaned against a wall for balance, a shadow in my own past, in the corner of a crowded medical room occupied by a single, shabby body covered with large, clear packs of cold material and surrounded by people in white coats - healers. The same boy suddenly pushed through the healers, wide eyed, and gave a despairing, silent scream that I couldn't hear but that I could see through his warm brown irises. Then the scenes started changing really fast, but one struck me like a gong - a girl with dark hair, green eyes, and a pretty face walking through golden fields like the ones I had just been in, quiet and sad. A name came to mind - The Fields of Peace - and another, Niome Vivienne...Elderson. Memories struggled to resurface, but I pushed them away. What was this? I wasn't here to relive my past!

And then, as if remembering something from long ago, I stood as the realization flowed in to me: I wasn't here to do anything, I wasn't here to stay. I couldn't. I mean, theoretically I could - I knew that - but I was here for a reason, wherever this was, and although it was my choice to stay in this wonderful haven or to return to the outside - or maybe the inside - world, I didn't really have a choice. I never had. My thoughts confused me, but the main idea was clear.

I realized so many things now, I saw how blind I had been - putting aside everything because I thought I would die, acting only in perseverance for myself, too afraid to start anything more than an unequal friendship with anyone. I had been horrible, a shell of myself, ever since a few weeks before Alex stepped foot on Silvien territory. Everything had happened at once - Nick's death, Nyx's death, Anders' submission, Alex, Naomi's possession, this quest turning into something much more than a mission. The dozens of Silviens that were part of me who I so subtly let down - I would not return for myself this time, but for them. I had come to this place selfishly, but I would leave it as a different person.

My breathing was harsh through my tears, and I forced myself to stop, only to remind myself that I didn't have always have to be strong anymore. I never had to, but I was the only person who hadn't seen this.

With that, I felt something inside of me finally melt away. It was tension that I had carried since I had been a small child, since before I had met with Psamathe - the anxiety of making a mistake and appearing weak. I let a memory resurface hesitantly - a boy with an impossibly rich shade of brown hair and light grey eyes - Anders, telling me that no one is perfectly strong on both the inside and out. That I was strong enough. I remembered a sparkling reflection of a clear night sky, a peaceful lake.

I collapsed, eyes tight with uninvited tears I rubbed away and face stiff, back onto my rock. Hippothoe had a gleam of something in her eyes, something strong, and Erato looked not triumphant but pleased, in an extremely annoying way.

Finally Erato spoke.  
"Many tried to tell you, but you were selfish, and you didn't listen."

"Will you return?" asked Hippothoe, urgent but calm.

I could see that she already knew that answer, but I offered up my objections. I have to admit it - I was scared. I was scared of what they would say when I returned, what everything would be like, who I would be, and what I would do.

"But - what use am I to anything? I cause more chaos, or at least am a part of more chaos than any amount of good I have done. "  
Hippothoe thought for a moment.

"Come."

I obediently rose. Now I stood in a beautiful garden, with silver moonlight etched into the folds of the flowers. Then, suddenly, a loud horn sounded, kind of like a hunting horn. A whole troupe of teenage girls briskly darted into the garden, all in silver tunics with bows and arrows slung across their backs or swords strapped to their thighs, ankles, belts, shoulders, or arms. One of them, with a crown of silver leaves braided into her light blonde hair, looked around warily, in a slightly crouched hunting position, and clutched a long, sharp javelin in one of her hands. It made me wary just looking at it - I could clearly imagine the tip stabbing right through my foot. The girl looked around, frowning, and spoke in a language I struggled to decipher - Ancient Greek.

"Something is not right."

One of the girls behind her twitched her bow nervously, and the girl beside her glared at her.  
The blonde girl twirled her javelin almost anxiously. It missed the ground by half an inch. "My lady?"

Another girl stepped forward, and everyone cleared a path for her respectfully. She was slender and muscular, with hair that was kind of colorless, but tinted silvery brown. She had silver bands around her arms and a large, arched bow. Part of her simple sandals were two silvery straps that intertwined up her legs to her mid-calf. She walked with a sort of power - young, but knowledgeable.

Before the other girl had time to speak, the blonde girl's eyes widened, suddenly, and she hissed and sprang at a nearby tree. I didn't really understand what happened next - it seemed like she fell down, temporarily stunned, ready to rise again and fight -except she didn't rise again, and by her absolute stillness I could tell she was unconscious, maybe dead.

A figure emerged from the trees, but not triumphantly, almost shyly - it was a woman in a draping dress, with hair in a thin, long, kind of cylindrical bun at the tip of her head, gently falling down until it reached the lowest part of her neck. She wasn't fat, but she definitely wasn't skinny either. Her face was rosy and round but unsmiling. She seemed confident, yet almost nervous, like she shouldn't be there.

However, she looked at the group of warriors with calm eyes, and half of them stifled gasps. All the girls but the one with silvery hair silently dropped to one knee. The silvery one gave a brisk, short bow of acknowledgement, which the other woman - after a stretching period of time - returned, slowly and carefully, like she didn't want to move too quickly for fear of breaking something. Then the woman smiled at them all, and it was the kindest smile in the world - one that came quickly, a smile of calmness - more relieved than friendly - a smile of agreement, of peace. The silvery haired girl turned slightly to the left.  
"Peace, my Hunters. It is Pax."  
The legend of the Hunters of Artemis echoed around in the back of my stifled mind. A group of girls, swearing off of men and receiving immortality unless they betrayed Artemis or died in battle.

The Hunters rose. Immediately I noticed that some of them looked puzzled - looking around, like they couldn't see the nervous goddess standing in front of Artemis.  
"Pax?" called out someone. "What is Pax?" A few girls shifted around and glared at the speaker.  
The woman from the bushes smiled tentatively.  
"I am Pax, child." She spoke in Latin, which I immediately understood, but a few of the girls looked upwards, struggling to decipher what the goddess had just said.

"If you are peace, then why have you killed Leanne?" said a girl I couldn't see. Pax looked at her sympathetically, but Artemis faced the girl, glowering slightly. "Have I taught you nothing? Everything in this world has come from chaos, Korina, in some way or another. Peace, and Pax, is-" Artemis shook her head. "We will speak of this later." Artemis turned back towards Pax, who looked at her kindly, and then spoke.

"All of us have both chaos and peace, dark and light, in us, child. It is our decision which side to act upon, and that makes us who we are."  
Artemis and Pax looked at eachother, and then Artemis bowed slightly, and Pax did as well. Then, Artemis turned back to her Hunters. "Let us leave the goddess to do as she may - in peace."

The Hunters streaked away in a flash of silvery clothes, and Artemis knelt over the dead girl, Leanne, and felt her forehead. Leanne's eyes opened, and she looked around, springing to her feet, as if nothing had happened and shes had somehow fallen down. Pax had disappeared, but Leanne charged at the bushes disorientedly until Artemis said something I couldn't hear to her and grabbed her arm and led her the way the rest of the Hunters had gone in a flash, leaving me alone in the garden.

Then, suddenly, I was sitting on the floor in my original dim, domed marble room, staring at Hippothoe.

"You fought for yourself" she said "but now you will fight with acceptance, you will fight for what you stand for. You have had much more chaos around you, simply in an attempt to try to influence you, and you camouflaged yourself in it instead of battling it, or worse, submitting and becoming part of it. Just because a person has fought many battles -internally and externally -does not mean that they are a servant of Eris."

At the thought of Eris, I narrowed my eyes. "Why did I have to save her? The world would be better off without chaos anyway."

It was Erato, not Hippothoe, who answered me this time. "The world could not exist without chaos, you silly girl. Chaos is the only thing that stops history from repeating again and again. Chaos propels mighty forces, and causes love and hate. Chaos is tied to anything with control in it, for chaos is what those who control fear the most."  
Hippothoe silenced her sister."You have made friends with chaos, Andronike the Third. You have sacrificed yourself to destroy something bad that came from chaos, and to rescue the very essence of chaos, the goddess Eris. You are wise. You would not have done these things if they were...unnecessary,... or wrong. " Hippothoe told me, her deep, navy eyes unreadable. Erato floated around the circular, domed, semi-dark room, her shiny, rich hair fluttering as if by some invisible breeze. "You believe chaos is always bad because it is part of your fatal flaw. Rage, Andra. Your fatal flaw is rage. Rage and chaos often operate together." Hippothoe gave her sister a sideways look as Erato flounced over and smiled at her.

"Pity" Erato sighed. "Rage never leads to love, only tragic endings."

With all her snide comments, Erato was well on her way to getting me into a so-called rage, despite her being a nereid and all, and the fact that her sister was helping me realize my life's worth, but I held my tongue, and my body.

Hippothoe rose to her well-muscled feet swiftly. There was a tattoo on her well defined biceps of lithe, running horses, who from my angle almost looked like the waves of the ocean. I stared after her as Erato wound her slender arm around her sister's and started to walk out of the empty rotunda, but Hippothoe stopped for a second to look back at me. "And Andra, please." she said, sounding almost annoyed. "I would know better than anyone. I am the strongest of all rages - the rage of the sea."

She turned back, but Erato had already slipped away from her and hurried out, and Hippothoe streaked off in a flash and left me alone with the circle of sunlight from the hole at the top of the dome and an impossible past to fix. I lay down miserably on the floor. Somehow, I had a hunch that if I would only fall asleep, I would return, I would be able to at least give it a shot - not for myself, not for my strength, but for all those I had hurt.

I pressed my cheek against the cool marble and closed my eyes, letting a sudden, rushing, pleasant fatigue overcome me.


	7. Chapter 7 (ALEX)

**This could potentially be a slight spoiler, but since like two people read my stuff - who cares?!  
AK**

ALEX

It's the largest thing in the clearing - a black, sleek coffin with artistic designs swirled into it, and dull copper handles on the sides, sitting in front of masses of chairs ,almost all with people sitting in them, a little over what I would expect to be the amount of the entire Silvien population. But it's only about half Silvien attendance, as far as I can estimate- I'm not sure how I distinguish the Silviens from everyone else, but whenever I look at a person, I can kind of tell if they're from Silvien soil. It's odd, but I don't really care.

The rows of chairs are all placed in the middle of what seems to be a large clearing in a dense forest. The sun is blocked by several clouds above, but it's not cold. As I got here on a crowded bus with no windows, I have no idea whether the thick forest surroundings are an illusion or for real, but I don't really care - where I am seems unimportant, now. Everything seems unimportant.

Taller adults and what even seemed to be aural figures of gods who I don't recognize or whose names I don't know sit next to what may well be half-bloods from the other camps, mixed in with pure mortals. At the far right there are a group of young women who have similar facial profiles, all dressed in white dresses and with varying shades of auburn or pitch dark hair. One woman has skin that was absolutely the color of marble, which stretched up to her white, pure, chalky-looking hair. Normally I would think this odd, but under these circumstances, it doesn't matter. Nothing does, anymore.

Clearly it doesn't matter to anyone else either- next to the chalk woman, a young, mortal looking man in a black tweed suit and a gray bowtie sat with his head in his hands next to who I was pretty sure was Anders sitting in the same midnight black tux I had first met him in, fresh from a different funeral. On Anders's other side was a pale woman with slick, rich black hair and a slender neck whose face was turned down. A group of girls with young faces but an almost shimmery glow around them sits together a few rows after me wearing identical tunics of silvery, dark material and meticulously similar expressions. One of them has short black hair and a quiver of arrows on her back.

The man finishes his speech, and everyone claps half-heartedly. In a burst of dazed anger, I stumble to my feet and stride up to the podium. Everyone looks at me boredly, thinking that this young man in a faded suit is going to give some drawling speech just like the last one. I glare out into the audience, take a breath, and lean my arms on the podium.

"Andronike Celacurret was an amazing, strong, inspiring, true, selfish, insolent arse."

Everyone looks at me. My words are propelled by the deep depression that lingers on my horizon.

"She killed herself without a thought, knowing it would affect people to their darkest days, thinking she was strong enough to survive and then giving up completely when she knew she couldn't." My words, whether true or not, spill out of my mouth and I cannot - will not - stop them. I half expect someone to come up and drag me away, but mixed emotions and unreadable faces stare up at me as I speak. "She died without a thought of her matched family, her friends, or anyone who loved her or cared about her. She was so bent on being strong, but now we see that within lies a person who was admirable but a coward, a person who inspired so many but" -

A loud cracking noise interrupts me. I figure someone's shot at me or something, and I duck reflexively, but the only thing moving are people's heads, everyone's eyes turning to the artful tomb beside me.  
There are small, intermittent noises like something being pried apart: chhhh-ch-ch-ch-ch! Crack.  
Someone has stood up in the crowd, someone on the outside edge, but I stare like everyone else at the tomb. What is happening? Did Andra turn into a zombie or something?  
Boom.  
Suddenly pounding noises come from inside the tomb, but they quickly die away.  
Form the corner of my eye, I see the figure standing twitch ever so slightly. Something thin and quick whistles by, a blur of darkness that flicks my ear as it flashes past. A millisecond later, before I have time to blink, even before I register pain from the bleeding nick in my ear, a band of ripped wood appears around the top edge of the coffin, and the blur disappears in the crowd, the person standing no longer. But someone else is standing. Rising.

The top of the coffin is splintered off, but it remains on top of the base, until a single arm thrusts out from the tomb. Long fingers, plain and marked with a few odd scratches.

Naomi leaps up from the crowd, and rushes over to the coffin, trying to lift the top off. "Alex!" she snaps, her voice edged with hysteria and anger that is almost a scream. My legs propel me forward, and my fingers are lifting the heavy top, lifting, lifting, until it falls from our grasp and slides over the rest of the tomb with a loud, might crash.

The next few moments are a daze. A person who looks a lot like Andra clambers over the edge of the coffin. She has bronze hair that is limp and looks damp, and deep brown eyes. She stand for a second, shakily, and her voice is breathless when she speaks, cracking on every other word.

"It is... HOT... in there."

Then she stumbles a few steps forward, knees buckling, and before I know it I am there to break her fall. It's automatic.

All in all, though, I barely catch her by the back, and it pains me to see how weakly one of her hands clings on to my arm. Her neck is wet with cold sweat and her fingers are like ice. Her entire body is shivering and slightly damp, and seized by a sudden conviction, I hug her so tightly she coughs, and then half hold her up as Naomi, tears streaming from her eyes, beams at Andra.

Cheers start up from behind me, loud and raucous, relieved shouts of pure joy - or is it relief? In any case, the tide of emotion is intoxicating, and soon I'm smiling too. I look into her eyes for a moment, and for a moment I'm speechless. She doesn't have enough strength to hide her emotions right now, and I see through her face and her eyes and the way she breathes that something's changed - something drastic, something that might make her into someone I know nothing about. I desperately need to hear her say something, do something, if only to reassure me.

"Well, welcome back." My voice is despicably surprised and nearly drowned out by people rising and coming towards us, everyone. It sounds like I wanted her to stay dead. I want to kick myself. It's a relief when I see that my words trigger a smile that, however faint, still looks like its paining her.

Her voice is a strained whisper, with some syllables coming out in a woosh of breath and others being sucked in..

"Ni-nicccce of you to-to drop by."

An irrevocable grin spreads across my face. It seems like a part, however small, is still there.  
"We were waiting -I mean, no one could believe you were...you know...dead."

The little amount of color left drains from her face. "I wasn't -" then she looks at me again. "You!" Her voice cracks, almost at a normal volume, still trying to breathe: "You knew."

I want to stay there and figure out what she means, talk to her and hold her forever, but everyone is flooding in around us, and I am forced to let go of Andra in the tide of hugs she is receiving, hoping that at least they won't suffocate her with their embraces. I am left standing alone in the midst of laughing, shouting people, holding on to what could have been and what seems like it never will.

Then someone-I don't know who-is by my side, whispering into my ear, a little sarcastic but almost humorously, like this is the first chapter of something yet to come.

"The One Who Concealed has returned, Alexandros."


End file.
